My Drunken Valentine
by Noel Rosarys Lake
Summary: Vincent has always mourned the loss of Lucrecia, but some days are worse than others. What will happen when Yuffie has to drag his drunken self out of the bar? Loosely based off the comic "My Drunken Valentine" by BlackLillian
1. Chapter 1

Ahhhh, I missed you guys. It's been a long, long time since I wrote anything, and I'm just glad I have some spirit back. Today's story is loosely based off of a comic I read a long time ago on Deviant Art, called "My Drunken Valentine". It's a really good comic, and I recommend y'all to go and give that girl some props for it.

And without further ado, I present My Drunken Valentine.

-God these transitions never pan out for me-

It was that day of the year again, and Tifa sighed as she unlocked the door to the Seventh Heaven. Now, most people would be happy on this particular day of the year, being as it was supposed to be the most romantic day, and day to spend with your partner and attempt to convey your feelings for them. That's right, it was Valentine's Day.

Note I said most people would be happy. But most people don't know Vincent Valentine. And out of the ones that did know him, only Tifa owned and ran a pub.

It had been quite a few years since they had stopped Sephiroth from destroying the world. Seven, to be exact. And in that time, Vincent's constant depression had grown steadily worse.

Most people would wonder what a hero of the planet would have to be depressed about, but all his friends knew of his past, and how his first, and only, love Lucrecia had perished. Ironically enough, the date of her death landed on the day of Vincent's birth. And that was today.

So Tifa knew to expect Vincent coming into the Seventh Heaven that day, and was simply preparing the bar for him, and only him, because after today, she would have to restock on all of her hard liquor due solely to Vincent.

As she walked into the pub, she left the "Closed" sign up on the door, so that no wandering patron would be happening to enter during the course of the day.

This wasn't the first year Vincent would come in and drink himself to the brink of death; he had done it since they stopped Sephiroth's clones.

Tifa sighed to herself; she knew it was going to be a very long day. "What time is it…" she muttered. Glancing at the clock, she saw it was two minutes to 9 o'clock, and reached under the counter for the strongest drink she had in the house. The exact second the clock struck nine, the door opened to reveal a man with long locks of black hair.

As he entered, Vincent removed his tattered red cloak and hung it from the coat rack on the wall.

"Vincent, you really should stop, you're going to drink yourself to death…" Tifa told him as he sat down on a stool. Vincent looked at her, and nodded curtly.

"I can't." were the only words he spoke for the rest of the day, because as soon as he did, he pulled out a small cloth bag and laid it on the counter. Tifa sighed for the last time, and poured him a drink.

-Seriously, I hate these transitions-

"I wonder what materia tastes like…"

Yuffie Kisaragi was once again in a mindless daydream revolving around materia, but that was to be expected, as she made her entire life revolve around it. Though, recently she had decided to take her ventures involving it into a new direction. Instead of acquiring it through illicit deeds, she opened up a materia shop.

And to make her life even more Yuffie-like, she opened it up right next to Seventh Heaven. But she decided to close shop early today, and go visit Tifa for the rest of the night, it had been so long since they talked!

It was roughly eight o'clock in the evening when she closed shop, and trotted peacefully over to the bar, surprised to see the "Closed" sign still plastered on the window. Walking up to the door, she tried the handle to find that, doubly surprised, it was unlocked.

"Teef? You in?" Yuffie called through the cracked door. Yuffie heard an exasperated sigh of relief.

"Yuffie, you have no idea how happy I am to see you…Look, I need you to do me a really big favor, would you mind?" Tifa asked as Yuffie walked into the bar.

"Yeah, sure!" Yuffie called out with her trademarked grin of stupidity.

"I need you to take Vincent home."

And then Yuffie got confused. "What?" She then noticed the man with long black hair sitting at the bar, silently, almost like a ghost. "Why?"

Tifa sighed. "I forgot that you…never mind, can you please take him home? I need to make some calls for the rest of the night."

Yuffie shrugged. "Yeah, sure." Tifa handed her some keys and a piece of paper.

"Great! Here's the keys to his apartment, and his address. And would you mind keeping an eye on him until tomorrow? I know it's a lot to ask…"

Yuffie laughed. "It's not a problem for the Great Ninja Yuffie!" She walked over and pulled Vincent by the arm. "Come on Vinnie, let's get you-woah…" Yuffie recoiled as Vincent turned toward her and she caught a whiff of his breath. She could smell enough alcohol on it to pickle a cucumber. "Teef, how much has he had to drink?"

Tifa said, without a sign of jest on her face, "20,000 gil worth." And Yuffie just grimaced. Then she took his arm, threw it around her neck, and picked him up.

"Come on big guy, no sense in drinking any more, you've already pickled your liver." Yuffie had muttered, but she doubt Vincent had heard her. He had a glazed look about him, like his mind was somewhere else.

Surprisingly enough, Vincent's apartment building had been right next to hers, and he was easy enough to lug around because, despite his size, he was a very lightweight man.

Hauling him into the building, she leaned him against the wall while fumbling with his keys; the alcohol coming off of him had started to affect her. After a minute, she unlocked his door, and he was resting on the edge of his bed in no-time.

Yuffie kneeled to be level with his face, staring into his vacant eyes. They were looking just away from Yuffie, and she could tell that he was very deep in his own thoughts. She lightly shook his arm, softly cooing at him, "Vinnie, hey Vinnie, wake up." Vincent's eyes regained a very small amount of life, and his locked with hers.

Yuffie smiled. "Hey, you look like you're tired. Do you want some help getting ready for bed?" Vincent nodded slowly, his eyes never looking away. Yuffie smiled lightly again. "Okay, do you want to start with your gauntlet?" Vincent slowly looked at his left arm, and then nodded lightly again.

Slowly, and gently, Yuffie started to undue the straps fastening the gauntlet to his arm, and then removed the shell itself. When she did, she became startled and almost dropped it in shock. "Oh my god…" she muttered. Under the gauntlet was Vincent's bare arm, covered in scars of all shapes and colors, along with a tattoo that she just couldn't make out. She looked back at Vincent.

"Vince, have you always had these?" He nodded again. Yuffie went to touch his left arm, but Vincent suddenly flinched. "Vincent, does it hurt?" Vincent no longer nodded, but his eyes held the answers Yuffie sought. "Is there anything I can do?" And his eyes seemed to respond, "I don't know."

Yuffie reached out to touch his arm again, and this time Vincent didn't flinch. Rubbing her fingers lightly from his elbow to his wrist, across scars and tattoo, she rested the palm of her hand on the back of his, and squeezed lightly. She felt him squeeze back.

And then suddenly a look came into Vincent's eyes, one Yuffie couldn't identify. And for the first time since that morning, Vincent spoke. "Yuffie…" his eyes seemed to plead to her, "help me…" Yuffie squeezed his hand again.

"How?"

Vincent didn't answer her, but he looked away for a minute. And Yuffie was about to ask again when lips cut her off.

-For real, I'm sick of having to do shit like this-

It struck like lightning, and was over just as quickly. It wasn't a very long kiss, only lasting a few seconds, but it seemed like eternity to Yuffie, who was just dumbstruck by it. And then she saw tears streaming down Vincent's face.

"Vince?" Yuffie tried to call out, appearing nothing more than a choked whisper.

He wrapped his arms around her, and buried his face into the crook of her neck, and for the first time in his life, Vincent Valentine sobbed.

Yuffie shot up the second she was awake. She looked around to find herself in an unfamiliar apartment, in a bed that was not hers, and lacking several items of clothing she did not remember removing. Hell, she couldn't even remember what happened the night before.

"Okay Yuffie, just try to remember what happened last night…" She got out of the bed slowly, careful not to make any noise. She started running through the events of the previous day.

"Alright, so I woke up at five and watched the sunset upside down from the balcony, then I did my morning routine of jumping across the rooftops to get to my store, then I opened shop for the day. I beat up three guys who tried stealing my materia. My precious precious materia…. Oh, right, focus! After that, I sold the pink materia that I couldn't use for the life of me, hehehe, peace of junk… And then I closed shop and went to visit Teef…"

And as Yuffie exited the bedroom and stepped into the living room, she gasped as she saw a picture on a tabletop. "And then I took Vincent home." Instantly, the memory of the previous night flooded back into her brain. She fell to her knees clutching her head because it hurt to think about what had happened, but she just couldn't force it out of her brain.

"Oh god oh god, I kissed Vinnie! Well, he kissed me… Did we kiss _each other_? Maybe we-GAH, BAD YUFFIE!" Yuffie started hitting her face, a furious blush exploding off of her cheeks.

Yuffie searched all throughout the apartment, but Vincent was nowhere to be found. Yuffie took another look around, and released an exasperated sigh. "I need to talk to Tifa…" And off to the bar she went.

-Finally it's over-

And here is where I'm going to leave off for now, I have shit going down, just got a tattoo yesterday and my dad is PISSED, so I might not be updating for another millennium, sorry guys. And make sure you spread my stories around! Recommend them to friends and other authors alike!

Also, sorry about the crappy transitions, my computer and fanfiction don't ever agree on how my story should be :/


	2. Chapter 2

Okay, and now...ONTO CHAPTER TWO

~coughtransitioncough~

I decided after a long hard thinking session, which gave me a headache by the way, that Vincent must have freaked out last night and ran away, and I just made myself at home. I sleep in the nude anyways, so it's plausible right? Not that I would have minded me and Vince-LEVIATHAN DAMMIT YUFFIE.

"Okay, okay, let's just go home for a few days and try and talk to Vincent after he has time to figure out what's going on in his dumb poo-brain..." I muttered.

~One week later, 9:00 AM~

I was awoken to the sound of my PHS blaring in my ear, and I almost smashed it on instinct until I noticed it was Teef's ringtone. "Moshi moshi..." I muttered as I flipped it open.

"Yuffie, have you seen Vincent lately?" Teef sounded worried. Teef was never worried. I sat up immediately.

"Not since Valentine's day, no, why?" I asked nervously.

"Nobody else has seen him since then either. Vincent was supposed to help Reeve with some WRO stuff last week, and he just called me saying that Vincent didn't show up, and he hasn't been able to find him since. It's not like Vincent to just forget about work, or not show up without calling, something's wrong." Uh oh. "Did something happen when you took him home?" Oh no, she knows! Oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god.

I sat there quietly for at least a minute. Tifa was the one who broke the silence.

"Yuffs, what happened when you took him home?" She asked, concerned.

I started to stutter. "Uh, I t-took him home and he was t-too drunk t-to help himself get t-to bed, and I couldn't make him sleep in his b-bar clothes.. So I helped h-him get his claw off, a-and then...h-he, um..." I went quiet again.

"Yuffie? What happened?" I can't take it anymore!

"VINCENT KISSED ME AND THEN I WOKE UP NAKED AND HE WAS GONE AND I THINK WE HAD SEX AND OH-MY-GOD I CAN'T BELIEVE I JUST SAID THAT!" I practically shouted into the PHS. When I realized what I had said, I dropped it and hid under my blanket.

It was a few minutes later that Tifa's voice came out of the phone and I peeked from under the covers. "Yuffie, are...are you sure?" I shakily picked up the PHS again.

"I-I don't know, I don't remember what h-happened after he kissed me. I-I mean, I sleep naked n-normally, so he could have freaked out th-that he kissed me a-and ran away, r-right?" I could hear Tifa mumbling to herself. It didn't sound good.

"Yuffie, when are you supposed to start?" Her voice was laced with so much motherly concern that there was no way I could mix up what she was asking. And there was no way I could lie to her either.

"...Five days ago-but I mean Gaia might just be playing a joke on me! Right? Right...?" I started to cry. I've never been late in my life, and Tifa knows it.

"Yuffie, you need to talk to him."

"But you just said that nobody knows where he is! Even Reeve doesn't, and Reeve knows where EVERYONE is!" I managed to get out through my blubbering sorrow. "I doubt he'd even care about it...It's not like he cares about anything other than his dead girlfriend... Not even me..." I started to cry even harder.

"Yuffie, do you...are you... in love with Vincent?"

~In some seedy bar in the Midgar Ruins, Noon~

"Another."

Vincent was sitting on a bar stool, minus his tradmark cloak and gauntlet, and was on his thirtieth shot of the day, and the bartender was happily refilling his shot glass without question, after being handed enough gil to liquer him up for a whole month. At the moment, Vincent was the only patron of the bar, and the bartender had been "kind" enough,(if you can call drooling over Vincent's wallet kind),to allow Vincent to sleep at his stool the last week.

It wasn't until his fiftieth shot that Vincent's vision started to blur. On his sixtieth a familiar redhead with an attitude walked through the door.

His cocky voice rang out through the bar. "Well well well, what do we have here? Didn't think I'd find you getting boozed up this early in the morning Valentine, and in THIS bar of all places. Though I can't blame you, nobody would think to look here for you when you want to drop off the map and forget something. I'd call Reeve and let him know where you are if I weren't here for the same reason." Reno's voice was cocky, at first. But then it came to harbor emotions that Vincent was all too familiar with. Pain, regret, sorrow, anger.

In the first show of friendship, or respect, from Vincent Valentine that Reno had ever seen, he motioned to the stool next to him.

"I could use someone to drink with, I'll buy."

'Boozed up Vince talks a lot more than sober Vince. And he's a hella lot friendlier too...' Reno thought to himself as he sat next to the gunman.

"So why are you here, Reno?" Vincent asked, his voice not betraying how much he had to drink at all.

"I...trouble with women..." Reno shifted his gaze to the shot that was put in from of him, gazing into the amber liquid hoping that it would fix everything. "You?" he asked Vincent before downing his shot.

"...The same."

~In the Midgar Ruins, 8:00 PM~

Okay, so after my little breakdown, WHICH WE WILL NEVER TALK ABOUT AGAIN, EVER, Tifa managed to coax me back from tears and convinced me to go look for Vincent. She told me that he'd probably be hiding where nobody would look for him, so that made Lucrecia's cavern out of the question, as is the Manor. She said he drinks all his problems away, but because of his...'modifications' by Hojo, his system processed alcohol almost as fast as he could drink it. Almost.

"So he's probably drinking his problems away again... Gah, I don't know where any bars are besides the one Reno took me to for my birthday, and I doubt Vincent would be in that dump..." I muttered to myself. Wait a minute. That's it! Reno! He'd know what bar Vincent would go to! I looked around, I found myself extremely close to where the bar Reno took me to was. Reno even told me he doesn't go anywhere else but that bar anymore, so that's always where he is when he isn't working!

Finding the bar was extremely easy, just a quick run through the ruins, a jump here, climb there, and voila, I was in front of a door that was barely hanging on the hinges in the middle of the ruins that only scum knew where it was. (Why did Reno take me HERE of all places? Then again, they did have that buy ten drinks get one materia free deal...) When I opened the door, to my surprise, it was packed, I couldn't even see the bar from the door.

I attempted to squeeze my way through all the beggars and vagabonds and scum that was in the bar, only to find someone snaking their arm around my waist. "Well looky here boys, we found ourselves our playtoy for the night." The man was easily the size of Barret, and twice as ugly. The grip on my waist was tight, and as I tried to pull his hand off, his other grabbed one of my arms, and another man grabbed the other. "No way, missy, you aren't getting away from us." The man then proceed to slam my head on the table, and I felt tearing at my clothes, and I did the only thing I could think of.

I screamed.

~HEYO~

It was quite a sight to see. Nobody in their right minds would have ever imagined this would happen. Vincent Valentine was laughing, drunk he may have been, but he was laughing like someone has gassed him, and Reno was sitting along with him, just as drunk, and laughing just as loud.

"Valentine, -hic- you're an alright guy, y'know? I always had you -hic- pegged as some uptight goth, but -hic- boy oh boy I was wrong." Reno shouted at the man who had just become his best friend in a matter of hours.

Vincent almost wasn't himself, and he put a hand on Reno's shoulder. "You're not as bad as everyone -hic- says Reno. Yuffie made you out to -hic- be some kind of crazy sadist with an electo-baton."

Reno feigned hurt. "Why would -hic- little miss Wutai ever say something so -hic- mean? I've been nothing but a gentleman to -hic- our little lady. I may have -hic- been a little too forward with her, -hic- but I'd never hurt a woman." Reno's mock-enthusiasm that came along with his drunken speech died as he looked down to his next shot. "At least...I'd never do it on purpose..."

Before Vincent could ask what was wrong, a scream rang out through the bar followed by raucous laughter. The voice screaming was familiar. He had heard that scream before. Seven years ago when one of his best friends had died, and there was only one person who screamed when that happened.

Reno had recognized it too, and he knew who was laughing. 'Oh god no' he thought to himself, and his body acted before his mind even knew what was going on. He grabbed his brand-new stun baton, pressed a shiny red button, and swung it behind him. The baton released a burst of electricity, and it knocked a good chunk of the bar out, enough to see the source of the screaming and laughter.

As soon as the people crumpled, Vincent saw Yuffie facedown on a table with men ripping her clothes off, and something inside of him snapped. He slid off of his stool, grabbing it by a leg as he did so, and threw it at the man holding her down. He threw it with all of the strength inside of him that his demons could muster, and it was enough force to cause the stool the throw the man into the wall. When the stool fell from his face, he was unrecognizable, blood pooling out of his nose, mouth, and one eye as well.

He didn't get up.

Both Vincent and Reno charged the rest of the group before their brains could even think. Pure drunken rage filled the both of them, and they fought with full force.

There were four men left, and as soon as their leader lay dead on the ground, they threw Yuffie onto the ground and pulled out various weapons as the unlikely duo attacked. Vincent charged two that had pulled out a baseball bat and metal chain, Reno had taken the two with a sword and daggers. By this point, the bar had cleared out because they didn't want to get involved.

Vincent was without his gun, but the fire that filled his veins gave him martial skills that even Tifa would envy. The man with the bat swung down at him, but Vincent used his forarm to block it, and the man dented his bat on Vincent's arm. The man with the chain slipped behind Vincent and tried to choke him.

Vincent was not amused.

He yanked the chain from his neck and whipped it at the man with the bat, the chain ensnaring itself around his neck, _very_ tightly. Dropping his bat, the man fell to the floor trying to pull the chain off, leaving Vincent to grab the other man, who was extremely short, by his head. Vincent picked the man up by his head alone, his fingers digging into the man's skull, and threw him out of the bar. He heard a pleasing '_SPLAT' _from outside.

And while this was happening, Reno was beating down on two thugs he had the displeasure of knowing. The one with a sword was the first to attack, attempting to bullrush Reno, who simply smashed his hands with his two batons, and sent enough volts through his body to make the man froth from his mouth.

The two dagger man attempted a swipe at Reno's wrists, but Reno just twisted them so the knives passed within millimeters of his skin, and brought both batons down upon that poor, stupid, unfortunate man's head. Needless to say, he wasn't getting up for a very, very long time.

The two men just stood their, the drunken rage still seething off of the both of them until the silence of the empty bar was broken. By crying. Vincent looked down to see Yuffie curled up under a table, her face buried in her knees, her clothes in rags, and almost not even there. The sight of this instantly sobered the once drunken and furious man.

Vincent knelt down, and warily put his gauntlet-less hand on her shoulder. "Yuffie?"

Yuffie's crying stopped, and she peeked out from behind her knees, only to stare into deep crimson eyes. After a few seconds, she started sobbing again, and grabbed for Vincents chest, curling up into his chest.

Reno was tying up the two thugs who were still alive, although barely, and was checking on the one Vincent had thrown outside, when a crack of thunder rang out throughthe whole city. This only caused Yuffie to become even more scared, hug Vincent tighter, and cry even more.

As it started to rain, Reno removed his jacket and walked over to Vincent, handing the jacket to him. Vincent looked at him questioningly, only to see a sad smile on his face.

"We can't let our fair lady Wutai be seen in public like this, now can we? And it's starting to rain, and I'd hate for her to get sick, especially after..._this_." He said. Vincent gladly accepted the jacket, and wrapped the fragile ninja in it. He picked her up, still curled into his chest, nodded to Reno who was calling Reeve, who nodded back, a silent gesture of friendship and comraderie between the two, and then stepped into the rain with the now sleeping Yuffie curled in his arms wrapped in a jacket.

~Unknown amount of time passes ;D~

Ugh, ow, why does my head hurt so much? I try to crack open my eyes, only to be met with a blinding whiteness. I hiss as I squeeze my eyes shut, and I feel something laying down on my stomach stir. It removes itself, and then says, "Yuffie? Are you awake?"

I force my eyes open despite the blinding light, to be met with the most beautiful pair of crimson eyes that I've ever seen. As the blinding light fades to a mere dazzle, I can see the face of the man staring at me. I can feel myself start to blush as I look at his handsome features, silently overlined by bags under his eyes, stubble on his face.

"Y-yeah, I am...where am I? And why does my head feel like chocobos have been dancing in it...?" The man smooths his palm across my forehead, and his skin feels cold against mine. Just this light touch makes the raging pain in my head dull to a mere throb.

"You're in the hospital. You were...attacked, and your head hit some hard surfaces... The doctors say that, minus a small concussion, you're perfectly healthy." He sounded...cold? No, distant. No..guilt, that's what I hear in his voice. But why? Surely he wasn't the one who attacked me, otherwise he wouldn't be here rubbing my forehead. I started to blush again as I realize his hand was still touching my face. "The doctors say you might not remember the attack, it's common with head trauma..."

"Uh-um...how...long have I been here?" His eyes darted to the ground as he mumbled.

"Two weeks. This is the first time you've woken up since you've been here..." He looked like he hadn't left the chair next to my bed for two weeks.

"Have you..been here the whole time?" He nodded, still looking at the floor. I pulled his hand from my face and held it in mine, rubbing my thumbs on the back of his hand. "I just have one last question, and I know it's going to sound really really stupid, but..." I stopped. His other hand came over top of mine, and he squeezed lightly. His eyes met mine again, and I felt my face heating up yet again.

"Ask me anything you want." As he said that, his words seemed to have that guilt in them once more.

"Uh-um...could you...could you tell me who you are?"

His eyes widened, and the little bit of light in them darkened. "You..don't remember me?" I shook my head. "Vincent Valentine? We..we saved the planet together?"

"I...I saved the planet?" I shifted uncomfortably, gripping his hand tighter.

"Cloud, Tifa, Barret, Reeve, Reno, Cid, Nanaki. Do any of these names sound familiar?"

"I don't know any of them."

~DUN DUN DUNNNN~

OH NO, what's that? Yuffie has amnesia? She doesn't remember who Vincent is? She doesn't remember anything? OH HO HO WHAT A TWIST! I bet you didn't see that coming! I was originally going to end the chapter with Vincent leaving the bar, and Yuffie wasn't going to have amnesia, but I decided, nah, screw that, let's make this story fun.

Maybe she'll get better, people do recover their memories after a while. But maybe I don't want her to ;) Who knows? Only time will tell, in the next chapter of My Drunken Valentine!


	3. Chapter 3

I looked at Yuffie. I grit my teeth a little to hide the horror I felt at the moment. "Yuffie, what do you remember?" She looked at me doe eyed. I could feel her stare melting through me, and it was minutes before she replied.

"You." I breath. It had been minutes since my last taste of air, since she started staring at me. She tilted her head, looking to the side. "I remember your face...and...standing in a field of sunflowers... I think we watched clouds, and then...it rained?" She tilted her head to the other side. "Yeah, it rained and we camped in a shack we found... I built a fire while you took off your clothes because you were soaked.. Then I took mine off and we started to dry them... We both sat next to the fire in our undies to dry out..."

"Yuffie, I don't remember that. Are you sure it happened?" I don't think she was lying when she said she remembered this, but I know it didn't happen. Maybe she pieced some memories together, and I got picked with it?

~PoV switch, 3rd person~

She looked heartbroken. "Wh-what..? But I remember it...so clearly... Was it just.. a dream? Fantasy?!" She was mumbling, and seemed to become angry with herself. Vincent couldn't just sit there and watch.

Yuffie was momentarily distracted by Vincent standing up that she wasn't prepared for the arms now wrapped around her torso. She was stunned by the sudden display of emotion from the crimson eyed god embracing her.

~Yuffie~

What. He's hugging me. "...Wha-"

"I'm sorry. Yuffie, please forgive me." His voice is dripping with guilt. What just dripped on head? Is he...crying? "It's my fault, it's all my fault." His words cut my heart. He did this to me? No, he couldn't have... could he?

"Wha-what do you m-mean?" I could feel a sweat almost break out from my skin.

"If you hadn't come looking to find me, you'd have never gone into that bar and those men wouldn't have attacked you." Oh good, my heart is beating again. So it wasn't him. Then why is he apologizing?

"What did they do to me?" Those words sent him rigid, I felt his whole body tense up.

He croaked out, "They grabbed you when you entered the bar. Then they...molested," I cringed in his arms, he squeezed me a little, "you. They slammed your head on a table, and tore off your clothes. You started screaming, and they were about to...to _take advantage_ of you." He pulled back from me and looked into my eyes. I could see an ember in his eyes, behind the window of crimson. No..it was a fire. "But I didn't let them."

Before my brain could even register what I was doing, I started to hug him back, and I started to tear up a little bit. "What did you do?" Argh, my mouth is moving without my brain!

"I...hurt them. A friend who was at the bar with me helped out, and took care of them when it was over. When I saw you hurt, I hurried as fast as I could to the hospital. The emergency room handled your head wound, which had started bleeding, and admitted you into this _nice and cozy _room." I could hear the hint of sarcasm in his voice. It was obvious all this white was starting to get to him. "They kept you sedated for the first night, and said you should wake up the next day, and now's the first time you're awake." I felt another drop land on my head. "Without even knowing who I am. Who any of us are."

"What did you say your name was again?" I hug him as tightly as I can, but I still feel weak.

"...Vincent..."

I pulled myself out of the hug. I said as I looked him dead in the eyes, "Okay then Vincent, for saving my life, I'll do everything I can to try and remember who you are. If...I can't remember, can...can we be friends? Were we friends before?" A smile graced his lips for a moment as I spoke to him.

"Yes, we were very good friends, Yuffie. Even if we did have some problems." I giggled.

"Okay good, because I have this nagging suspicion that this is the longest conversation you've ever had."

~Two days later~

They finally discharged me, woo! After deciding that I was completely fine besides my memory loss, they let me sign myself out. They said there were a few lab results still pending, but they'd call me with the details once they were finished. I had managed to convince Vincent to go home and shower every couple of days, but he always showed up an hour later and stayed with me. He tried to jog my memory every once in a while, but he never tried to force anything into my head. I could tell he was trying his hardest, and I felt bad for forgetting him. I tried to tell him that once, but he just said it was all his fault.

"Yuffie, we're here." Vincent's deep voice snapped me out of my head as we reached an apartment complex. I furrowed my brow, unhappy with the outside of the building. It didn't look like a place I'd want to live, but maybe I did something with the inside of my place to make it spanking awesome.

"Can you, uh, show me my place?" Vincent nodded, and led me up the stairs to my door. After unlocking it, he opened the door to reveal an apartment completely ransacked.

Vincent was inside instantly, his gun drawn-wait, he had a gun? He cleared the whole place in about thirty seconds, before he let me inside. As I walked around, I could see a few picture frames thrown on the ground and shattered. I picked up one and stared at the picture. It was of Vincent and I, with seven other people there. We were all sitting in front of a mansion; 6 men, 3 women. There were only two things that stood out in the photo, Vincent, and a woman wearing a pink dress who had long brown hair and green eyes. Vincent looked like he had been trying to get out of the picture, but I had him pushed onto the ground by his shoulders. His face almost seemed like it was angry, but his eyes didn't seem so, and I could almost see his mouth behind a giant red collar, and it looked like he was smiling.

The woman, though, seeing her made me feel sad. Like I was staring at someone who was important to me that was gone. I held up the picture to Vincent. "Who is she?" Pointing to the girl.

Vincent was slow with his reply. "...Her name was Aerith. You could say she was like a sister to everyone in that picture..."

I frowned. I think I feel some tears fighting their way out of my eyes. "Was? Then I was right, she's dead...isn't she." I wasn't asking. When Vincent didn't reply, I started to cry. Vincent was quick to wrap his arms around me in a comforting way. I don't know how, but I could tell he knew I didn't remember. But if I don't remember her, why am I crying?

It took me a few good minutes, but I stopped crying. I sniffled, wiping the tears from my eyes. "Get it all out?" Vincent asked me. I nodded in response. I looked around the house more, but being here felt...wrong. Minus the obvious destruction, I felt like I didn't belong here. This place didn't feel like home.

I shuddered. "I want to leave." I looked up at Vince. "Can I st-tay with you?" I felt heat rising to my cheeks again, I hope he doesn't notice..

Vincent turned away, averting his eyes from mine, but I saw embarassment before he did. "I don't have enough room." Was his answer. It's not that I didn't believe him, it just seemed like he wasn't telling me everything. "You could stay with someone else, like Tifa, or Cid and Shera." I shook my head. He told me a lot about the people I knew, and those were the ones that would have willingly taken me in without a second thought, but I wouldn't feel right imposing on their lives. Tifa had three kids to raise with Cloud, only one being theirs, and Shera was on the way with Cid's first.

I shook my head. "It just wouldn't feel right." I think he knew what I meant.

He was silent for a moment, but then he slowly let go of me, and pulled a phone out of his pocket. "I think I know somewhere you can go..." he said, before walking out on the balcony.

~Vincent~

I started dialing Tifa before I was even out of the door. She picked up on the second ring.

"Vincent, how is Yuffie?" she had calmed down quite a bit since I had last called her two weeks ago, after Yuffie had woken up. She had been frantic, worried, and most of all, heartbroken when I told her what had happened to her memory. She had kept me in charge of taking care of her while she was in the hospital, since she didn't want to force herself onto Yuffie.

"Better. She was discharged today, but her apartment has been broken into." She gasped. "On top of that, I have the feeling that she is put off by this place, that it doesn't feel like a home to her. She was uncomfortable the moment she saw the complex. She asked if she could stay with me, but..." I went silent after that. Tifa knew what my apartment was like.

"I understand Vincent. But she needs somewhere to stay, couldn't she stay with us or Cid?"

"I told her that, but I don't think she's comfortable with meeting everyone for a second time just yet. There is always another option, though I would prefer not to resort to it." Tifa's voice was heavy.

"There isn't any other alternative Vincent, what is it?"

"The ShinRa Manor." Tifa was quiet. "I've been back over the years, fixing it up in case I ever decided I needed a place to..._rest._" Tifa knew what I meant. "There's certainly enough room there.."

"Do whatever you have to Vincent. I haven't told anyone what happened yet. As far as anyone that isn't you, me, or Reno knows, Yuffie is off being Yuffie. Just...keep her safe, Vincent..." Tifa hung up the phone after, and I put mine away. I have a feeling that there was something she wasn't telling me.

I walked back into the apartment, and I saw Yuffie sitting against the wall, hugging her knees to her face. "Yuffie?" She looked up, her eyes were a little red and puffy. "Pack some of your clothes, we're going somewhere."

~Nya~

So, how was it? A little short, I know, but everything I've been writing is short. I'd prefer to give you guys a semi-consistant update with short chapters to an even more inconsistant update schedule with epic chapters. And be sure to leave a review! As anyone who torrents knows, EVERYONE HATES LEECHES! Be a seeder y'all :D


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